Prisoner Quotes - Page 31

• Prison service vans that travel 90 miles to take a prisoner 90 yards; paedophiles free to leer at children in the very parks where they have committed horrific crimes.

  Trevor Phillips

  Children, Yards, Parks

  4 Copy quote

• The lives of prisoners of war after they are returned is almost never discussed, never explored.

  Gideon Raff

  War, Prisoner Of War

  6 Copy quote

• In a world of democracies, in a world where the great projects that have set humanity on fire are the projects of the emancipation of individuals from entrenched social division and hierarchy; in such a world individuals must never be puppets or prisoners of the societies or cultures into which they have been born.

  Roberto Unger

  Fire, Humanity, Democracy

  "The ideas interview: Roberto Unger". Interview with John Sutherland, www.theguardian.com. February 28, 2006.

  13 Copy quote

  Show source

• Human rights advocates, for example, claim that the mistreatment of Iraqi prisoners is of a piece with President Bush's 2002 decision to deny al Qaeda and Taliban fighters the legal status of POWs under the Geneva Conventions.

  John Yoo

  War, Rights, Decision

  "Terrorists Have No Geneva Rights" by John Yoo, www.wsj.com. May 26, 2004.

  25 Copy quote

  Show source

• The photographs of Iraqi prisoners being subjected to degrading and humiliating treatment by their captors, and the reports of acts of sexual abuse, physical abuse, and other acts of maltreatment shock the conscience.

  Ed Markey

  Abuse, Photograph, Treatment

  24 Copy quote

• In early youth, as we contemplate our coming life, we are like children in a theatre before the curtain is raised, sitting there in high spirits and eagerly waiting for the play to begin. It is a blessing that we do not know what is really going to happen. Could we foresee it, there are times when children might seem like innocent prisoners, condemned, not to death, but to life, and as yet all unconscious of what their sentence means.

  Arthur Schopenhauer

  Children, Mean, Blessing

  Arthur Schopenhauer (2014). “Suffering, Suicide and Immortality: Eight Essays from The Parerga”, p.3, Courier Corporation

  41 Copy quote

  Show source

• Our souls are prisoners of the terror of death, and the day is beautiful.

  Paulo Coelho

  Beautiful, Death, Soul

  "The Fifth Mountain: A Novel". Book by Paulo Coelho, 1996.

  4 Copy quote

  Show source

• That there is also freedom in captivity, only a prisoner can claim. Coming from a prison guard, this statement would be blasphemy.

  Friedrich Durrenmatt

  Prison Guards, Captivity, Would Be

  "About Tolerance" by Friedrich Dürrenmatt, 1977.

  21 Copy quote

  Show source

• There was zero time for reflection. We had to feed the prisoners three meals a day, deal with the prisoner breakdowns, deal with their parents, run a parole board. By the third day I was sleeping in my office. I had become the superintendent of the Stanford county jail. That was who I was: I'm not the researcher at all. Even my posture changes--when I walk through the prison yard, I'm walking with my hands behind my back, which I never in my life do, the way generals walk when they're inspecting troops.

  Philip Zimbardo

  Running, Zero, Sleep

  5 Copy quote

• Education has become a prisoner of contemporaneity.

  Camille Paglia

  Education

  Camille Paglia (2011). “Sex, Art, and American Culture: Essays”, p.8, Vintage

  9 Copy quote

  Show source

• If I were not a king, I would be a university man; and if it were so that I must be a prisoner, if I might have my wish, I would desire to have no other prison than that library [the Bodleian].

  King James I

  Kings, Men, Wish

  53 Copy quote

• [To a group of women prisoners:] You're luckier than I am. You're wanted and I'm not.

  Nancy Astor

  Groups, Wanted

  7 Copy quote

• At twenty your choices are almost unlimited. At fifty you're a prisoner of past decisions. At seventy you have no free will left at all.

  Helen McCloy

  Past, Choices, Decision

  4 Copy quote

• I live on the limit, Vyvyan. The limit, because I'm a rider at the gates of dawn and I take no prisoners!

  Rik Mayall

  Dawn, Limits, Riders

  "Fictional character: Rick". "The Young Ones" (TV Series), www.imdb.com. 1982–1984.

  6 Copy quote

  Show source

• It is as if the soul of the continent is weeping. Why does it weep? It weeps for the bones of the buffalo. It weeps for magic that has been forgotten. It weeps for the decline of poets.It weepsfor the black people who think like white people.It weepsfor the Indians who think like settlers.It weepsfor the children who think like adults.It weepsfor the free who think like prisoners.Most of all, it weepsfor the cowgirls who think like cowboys.

  Tom Robbins

  Children, Thinking, Cowboy

  4 Copy quote

• The day of my arrest I was first put in a room where there were already several other prisoners, most of them Arabs. They laughed when they saw me. Then they asked what I was in for. I said I'd killed an Arab and they were all silent

  Albert Camus

  Rooms, Saws, Firsts

  Albert Camus (2012). “The Stranger”, p.72, Vintage

  4 Copy quote

  Show source

• When a uniform exercise of kindness to prisoners on our part has been returned by as uniform severity on the part of our enemies,you must excuse me for saying it is high time, by other lessons, to teach respect to the dictates of humanity; in such a case, retaliation becomes an act of benevolence.

  Thomas Jefferson

  Kindness, Exercise, Humanity

  Thomas Jefferson, Brett F. Woods (2009). “Thomas Jefferson: Thoughts on War and Revolution : Annotated Correspondence”, p.18, Algora Publishing

  4 Copy quote

  Show source

• Even when one sits in the prisoner's dock, it is interesting to hear talk about oneself.

  Albert Camus

  Interesting, Trials, Docks

  9 Copy quote

• However, the danger in [socially unbalanced relationships] is that the subjection of the woman temporarily calms the man's jealousy but also renders it more demanding. He ends up making his mistress live like those prisoners on whom light is shone day and night in order for them to be better watched. And things always end in tragedy.

  Marcel Proust

  Night, Men, Light

  12 Copy quote

• A man is the prisoner of his power. A topical memory makes him an almanac; a talent for debate, disputant; skill to get money makes him a miser, that is, a beggar. Culture reduces these inflammations by invoking the aid of other powers against the dominant talent, and by appealing to the rank of powers. It watches success.

  Ralph Waldo Emerson

  Memories, Power, Men

  Ralph Waldo Emerson (1866). “The Complete Works of Ralph Waldo Emerson: Comprising His Essays, Lectures, Poems, and Orations”, p.363

  4 Copy quote

  Show source

• We are all prisoners but some of us are in cells with windows and some without.

  Khalil Gibran

  Spiritual, Cells, Deep Thought

  50 Copy quote

• Don't be a prisoner of your own style!

  Armin van Buuren

  Music, Style, Trance

  Twitter post from Apr 27, 2011

  100 Copy quote

  Show source

• Nobody wants a political prisoner, but a political emigrant is no problem.

  Alexei Navalny

  Political, Want, Problem

  5 Copy quote

• All this [Soviet labor camp for political prisoners] brings about one marked change in your physical appearance; by the end of your first year, you will have what are known as 'zek's eyes.' The look in a zek's eyes is impossible to describe, but once encountered, it is never forgotten. When you emerge, your friends, embracing you, will exclaim: 'Your eyes! Your eyes have changed!' And not one of your tormentors will be able to bear your scrutiny. They will turn away from it, like beaten dogs.

  Irina Ratushinskaya

  Dog, Eye, Years

  7 Copy quote

• We know the Russian methods exactly. I haven't the faintest intention of being taken prisoner by the Russians.

  Heinrich Muller

  Taken, Intention, Method

  "U.S. Intelligence and the Nazis". Book by Richard Breitman, 2004.

  7 Copy quote

  Show source